Thief - Interview @ Gamingbolt

Ravi Sinha: We’ve heard that there will be changes to the progression system in Thief with the team eschewing XP in favour of using gold to buy equipment. How would it have worked if the XP system remained in place? Will these changes make the game more fundamentally Thief-like in nature?

Daniel Windfeld-Schmidt: We decided to put more emphasis on stealing and looting,that is what the game is about after all. We decided against having the XP system for a few reasons and we think the experience is strong enough without it. This also tallied with some feedback we received from the community and they reacted well to the news we were removing it so we’re glad Wedecided on that route.

Ravi Sinha: Thief will be releasing next year on next gen as well as current-gen consoles. It will also be releasing on PC. When stacked up to the PS4 and Xbox One, how does the PC version look in comparison? Did the more PC-like architecture of the PS4 and Xbox One make development across them easier?
Daniel Windfeld-Schmidt: The PC version is hugely important to us as this is the platform that the series originated on. In a similar vein to Deus Ex: Human Revolution we are taking this platform really seriously. We’re really pleased with how the game looks and feels on all platforms and PC, PS4 and Xbox One all look great. The architecture of the new machines really helped us fulfill our vision too for sure.

We also kept the fact that you can complete Thief without knocking anyone out or killing anyone.

The bad

Will players’ approaches to missions affect the difficulty of latter missions? Not really, It is not that something you do earlier in the game will effect something later. It is not really the way this game plays out. The player has a lot of choice and a lot of different ways to play each level, and a lot of choice when it comes to the huge City Hub area but we decided against branching the storyline depending on Garrett’s choices.